President Hanno sitting in the Office of Admission with his wife, Susan, their son, Ted, and daughter, Emily.

The major turning point in Dennis Hanno’s professional life coincided with the arrival of his first child, Ted.

He was presiding over a fast-growing accounting practice in a small community in upstate New York but questioning whether the professional path that he had imagined for himself was what he really wanted to be doing. It was a subject that he and his wife, Susan, had been discussing for some time.

“My analysis with Susan was that I really love working with people,” he said, recounting the conclusions that emerged from taking stock of what he liked about accounting and what was important to him for the future. “I love doing new things, and I love helping people to understand issues and ideas. Most of all, I knew that I wanted to help people improve their lives. And that led me to the idea of returning to college to earn a Ph.D.”

Within six months, Hanno had embarked on the journey to earn a Ph.D. and begin a career in academia that would take him from the suburbs of Boston to major cities in Europe and Asia to villages in Africa.

Diving in

Fast-forward 33 years. It’s barely one week into Hanno’s term as president of Wheaton College and a small crowd stands on the lawn between the Mars Center for Science and Technology and the Haas Athletic Center. The group—Head Women’s Basketball Coach Melissa Hodgdon, students serving as counselors for her summer camp, 50 elementary and middle school girls and a small crowd of staff members—waits for President Hanno, who has been delayed by a meeting that has run past its allotted time.

Finally, he jogs down the stairs from the Mars Center to the waiting crowd, pulls on a Wheaton athletics T-shirt over his dress shirt and tie, and joins the coach and recently graduated team captain, Sarah Fitzgerald ’14.

“All right! Hello, everyone. ... We’re here today to accept our ‘Chilling for Charity’ challenge,” Hodgdon says for the benefit of the video camera recording the moment. The purpose of the event is to raise money to fight cancer; the event itself requires an ice cold bucket of water to be dumped over the heads of participants, literally.

When he is introduced, Hanno calls out some of his former colleagues at Babson College to also take on the challenge and then says, “Let’s do it, guys. I don’t think you can handle it as well as we can. We’re going to be like Mount Rushmore here. We’re not even going to move when this water hits us.”

The new president proves as good as his word. Apart from a few deep breaths and some shouts of exhilaration (that it’s over?), neither he nor Coach Hodgdon nor Fitzgerald move as the cascade of ice water pours over their heads to the delighted roar of the crowd of onlookers.

But following a quick celebration, Hanno moves to the edge of the crowd. His wife, Susan, hands him a towel to dry off, and then he rushes back to the Presidents’ House for a change of clothing before a meeting to delve into the college’s budget.

The fun event is pure Hanno. Throughout his career in higher education, he has built a well-deserved reputation for being spontaneous, extremely approachable and engaged in every aspect of student life—from the classroom and conference room to athletic fields and every other spot on campus.

At Babson, where he served most recently as its provost and academic vice president, Hanno made it a point to announce late-night pizza parties on social media, just hours before arriving in a campus lounge with a delivery of 100 pies, for example. On one occasion, he not only arranged the opening of a group meeting room at 3 a.m. so that students from India and Pakistan could watch their national teams play each other, but he joined them as well.

The depth and breadth of his connections to the Babson community prompted an informal group of students and graduates at the business school to start a very visible social media campaign to have Hanno named as the institution’s next president. After the college’s board of trustees chose to appoint former Massachusetts Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey to the post, Hanno was promoted to the post of provost, responsible for overseeing all of the college’s graduate and undergraduate programs.

The Wheaton community began to experience his informal and highly connected style almost immediately after his selection as the college’s eighth president was announced in late February. Students, alumnae/i, faculty and staff offered congratulations and messages of welcome to Hanno on Twitter, and he responded with alacrity. In fact, the exchanges led to invitations to attend campus events, some of which he was able to accept, such as WheaTalks, the annual event in which 10 students and faculty each present an idea or proposal in 10 minutes.

“I just think that it’s so important to make a connection with people,” he said. “I’ve always been a big user of social media and I try to be an early adopter in any way I can. I’m on Twitter, I’m on Facebook, I’m on Instagram, which is the new hot place for me. I very consciously use it as a tool to communicate things about myself and about things going on at the institution,” he said.

“Social media gives us a whole new vehicle to connect with a much broader audience, particularly when you think about alumnae and alumni who are so connected to Wheaton. This gives me the opportunity to share things with them in an instant.”

Starting out

Dennis Hanno learned about the virtues of hard work and the power of education early. He grew up in a family of six on a dairy farm in Glenfield, N.Y., about 50 miles east of Lake Ontario. The farm, with 100 cows, was a full-time occupation for the family. His father handled the bulk of the work, but there was plenty for each of his children, and Hanno recalls learning to drive the tractor early on so that he could spread manure on the fields. (He also remembers first meeting his wife, Susan, when they were children, though only as acquaintances. Her father was the veterinarian who cared for the family’s livestock.)

“I always had chores to do every day,” he said. “There was never a vacation. I mean, you couldn’t. You can’t say to the cows, ‘Hey, we will be back in two weeks,’” he said. “So I never remember taking an extended vacation of any kind, other than a day to go to the state fair, or something like that.”

Working on the farm taught Hanno an early lesson on the importance of “getting the job done, no matter what it takes” and the power of working as part of a team.

“On the farm, everybody had a role to play. And you learn that no matter how trivial your chore might seem—feeding the cows or taking the manure out or whatever it was—it absolutely had to be done,” he said. “So it was your responsibility to keep things moving; everyone else was going to rely on you to do your job.”

Education received top billing at the Hanno household. “Starting from early on, my mother made us all realize that education was the key to opportunity, that education was the way we could all have an impact,” said Hanno, who excelled in school and also competed in sports as a three-season athlete—football, basketball and track. “Education was the way that we could open up so many different doors for each other.”

With encouragement from his mother, herself a teacher, Hanno applied for admission to several colleges, including Michigan State and Notre Dame. “And when I got into Notre Dame, it was like a dream come true,” he said. “The guidance counselor came, pulled me out of class, and said, ‘You know, we just heard that you got into Notre Dame,’” and it seemed like there was some urgency around making a decision right away.”

Hanno recalls hesitating over his choice, knowing that selecting the University of Notre Dame would place a heavy financial burden on his family. “I remember the guidance counselor; my mother, who was substitute teaching that day; and I standing in the hallway, talking about this, and my mother said, ‘If you want to go to Notre Dame, we’ll do whatever it takes to get you there.’”

He pauses for a moment, appreciating anew the enormity of that moment and his mother’s determination. “My mother would have had to make the extra income, which she did by substitute teaching at about $30 a day, if I remember,” he said. “And when I got to Notre Dame, I worked. I worked a ton of hours at the cafeteria, and ended up taking a job as a bartender later on.”

Education continues to be a central point of emphasis for the Hanno family. His wife, Susan, is an elementary school teacher. Indeed, they met again as college graduates, just before Susan took her first teaching job in Boston, and Dennis was poised to begin a one-year master’s program in accounting. For much of their married life, both have worked in education and lived as part of a college community. Today, their daughter, Emily, also works in education, as a Teach For America staff member.

Making an impact

The idea that education creates opportunity represents a central operating principle for Hanno, who identified it as one of his core values when he was introduced to the Wheaton community in Cole Memorial Chapel in February.

“Higher education gave me opportunities I never dreamed imaginable,” he said. “Certainly, I never dreamed that I would have the opportunity to be at the head of this great institution. What has always been important to me is to think about how we … can help to create that opportunity for the people we work with, and even spread that opportunity beyond.”

The promise of being able to help others to share in the opportunities of education spurred Hanno to pursue and earn his Ph.D. in accounting from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and then to take a position teaching accounting, first at Boston College, where he taught for two years, and then at UMass. Within six years, he had been invited to join the administration of the university’s Isenberg School of Management as its dean for undergraduate matters, and he dove into the role with remarkable energy.

Thomas O’Brien, the former dean of the Isenberg School, said, “The whole community at the University of Massachusetts Amherst knew who Dennis was. He developed a number of programs and activities for undergraduates that enriched their education.”

The former accountant who had chosen to major in business rather than history—his first undergraduate interest—championed the arts and humanities, sciences and social sciences for the students enrolled at the university’s business school.

“Higher education offers the opportunity for students to explore the challenges of the world from many, many different perspectives,” he said. “The context that that breadth of study provides is critically important in today’s world, and it’s why the liberal arts are so important, no matter what you plan to do.”

In 2006, when he was recruited to serve as the undergraduate dean at Babson College in Wellesley, Mass., he brought that conviction with him, and worked with faculty to revise the school’s curriculum. The result was an emphasis on the study of liberal arts disciplines for all students at the institution and integrated entrepreneurial leadership across the campus.

A former colleague, Elizabeth Swanson Goldberg, a professor of English and the chair of the arts and humanities division at Babson, praised his impact at the college. “Dennis consistently put himself on the line to ensure that Babson lives up to its commitment to deliver fully half of its credits in the liberal arts,” Professor Goldberg said. “He also envisioned and implemented a range of rich, innovative programs that brought liberal arts and entrepreneurship together, almost always with the kind of global focus that marks the most relevant educational initiatives today.”

Global service

Dennis Hanno met with the Student Government Association in March as Wheaton’s newly selected president.

Hanno may be best known for a collection of programs that take place at neither UMass or Babson but has involved both communities: business development and entrepreneurship workshops for high school students that he runs in several African countries.

The effort began thanks to a chance conversation that Hanno had with UMass nursing professor Leda McKenry, who had been taking nursing students to Ghana to conduct vaccinations and health screenings. The people where she was working were also interested in receiving assistance in business development and technology. Intrigued, Hanno jumped at the opportunity.

“I thought that I would just go once or twice and then move on,” he recalled. “But, the first time I went, I connected with the people that I met with in Sekondi and Takoradi, Ghana.”

Since then, he has been back many times, building an entrepreneurship and leadership program in which Hanno and students, faculty and staff from UMass, and later Babson, would lead high school students in designing and launching business ideas and community-based projects. The project has expanded over the years to Rwanda, Tanzania and Kenya.

“Dr. Hanno has had a tremendous impact in our region,” said the Rev. Robert Andoh, who leads the Assemblies of God Church in Sekondi, Ghana. “He is a friend to our community, which has been deprived of many things. I personally feel that Dr. Hanno is a man who, anywhere he finds himself, the people around him will be glad that he is there.”

For his part, Hanno prefers to talk about the effect that the work has had on his students and himself. When he spoke in Cole Chapel, he alluded to his work in Africa while extolling the value of service.

“As I have journeyed through life, I have figured out that we all have a lot of gifts,” Hanno said. “But those gifts only have value if we share them with others. … And what I have found is that the more you share, the more you grow, and that’s both as an individual and as a community.”

Hanno expanded on that point in a conversation during the summer. “For me, there is great satisfaction in working with people and seeing that I could have an impact on their lives. And what really keeps me going back is the fact that I am having an impact not only in these communities in Africa but also on the people that I take with me.”

Indeed, it’s work that he intends to continue, even as he serves as president of Wheaton. Hanno has told numerous groups that he plans to lead new trips and new programs to Africa, this time with Wheaton students as his partners.

Looking ahead

The first order of business for Hanno, however, is settling into the role of president and organizing the college community to continue its response to a public that is deeply skeptical about the value of liberal arts study.

“Liberal arts colleges face a number of pressures, but I believe that two distinct but linked criticisms present the most pressing issues,” Hanno said. “First, there is a growing belief among some that higher education should focus primarily on job training and the long-term financial security for students.

“The second criticism relates to the financial model. Many believe that no matter what the outcomes for students, the liberal arts education model is too expensive to be able to sustain. Wheaton, along with many other colleges, needs to proactively address these criticisms.”

Given Hanno’s past work championing the liberal arts, and his appointment as Wheaton’s president, it’s no surprise to hear him reject those ideas. “I believe that a liberal arts education is exactly the kind of education that students need: it provides them with the intellectual and practical skills needed to navigate a complex world, not just in a first job but throughout their lives,” he said, before adding, “We need to be mindful of the sacrifices that families make when they invest in a Wheaton education, and continue to provide the high value and impact that makes this investment worthwhile.”

The new president has been consistent in saying that he did not arrive on campus with a ready-made plan for the college’s future. In fact, he has said that the college has many promising initiatives under way and that his role will be to help the community—students, alumnae/i, parents, faculty and staff—articulate a shared vision for the future. Hanno began that process of consultation well before he took office in July, and he expects to continue the work for some months to come.

But he is quick to add one thing that he believes deeply already:

“What Wheaton does now to prepare its students is exactly what is needed to solve the many challenges facing the world today. Innovative and creative solutions can only result from having multiple perspectives and views on an issue.”

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2014/09/15/driven-by-values/feed/0Wheaton College President-elect Dennis HannoPresident Hanno sitting in the Office of Admission with his wife, Susan, their son, Ted, and daughter, Emily.Hanno chillin DSC_0053Hanno-5760Wheaton President-Elect Dennis HannoDennis Hanno met with the Student Government Association in March as Wheaton’s newly selected president.Transforming liveshttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2014/05/07/transforming-lives/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2014/05/07/transforming-lives/#respondThu, 08 May 2014 03:08:05 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=9505

John Wieland (left), Susan Walden Wieland ’60 (center) and family during Homecoming Weekend in 2008, when the Alumnae/i Association presented Susan with an Alumnae/i Achievement Award in honor of her service in promoting education and the arts

Couple establishes scholarship endowment

Susan Walden Wieland ’60 and her husband, John, recently established an endowed scholarship fund at Wheaton in Susan’s name and to honor President Ronald A. Crutcher’s service to the college. John recently talked about the couple’s connection to Wheaton and their motivation for their contribution to the college.

About Susan and John Wieland

The Wielands moved to Atlanta one year after they married. They founded a home-building business, John Wieland Homes and Neighborhoods, growing it into a company operating in four states. John estimates that he has built more than 30,000 homes in his career. They have two children—a daughter, Lindsey, and a son, Jack.

The pair are art lovers and active philanthropists in Atlanta. John has served for more than 20 years on the board of directors of the High Museum of Art, including three as chair of the board. The couple’s personal art collection numbers more than 600 pieces and is focused on art in all media where the theme of houses represents a central image.

Susan has played a leadership role in a number of nonprofits, including the Woodruff Arts Center, the Atlanta Women’s Foundation, Atlanta Habitat for Humanity, the Westminster Schools, Families First, Atlanta Children’s Shelter and the Alliance Theatre, among others. Wheaton presented her with an Alumnae/i Achievement Award in 2008 in recognition of her service to the community.

How did you both come to be supporters of the college?

Wheaton was Sue’s life for four years, and we met thanks to an Amherst College fraternity brother of mine who married one of Sue’s Wheaton classmates. They thought we would be right for each other, and they were correct. Since our marriage 50 years ago, Wheaton has been a shared interest for both of us. For the past 10 years we have tremendously admired how President Crutcher has led Wheaton.

Why did you decide to create the endowed fund at this time?

We both have become concerned by the financial crisis that is faced by far too many undergraduates when their family’s circumstances change and the student and their family are no longer able to handle the academic bills and related expenses. Our gift is designated to supporting students who are currently enrolled but end up facing these unfortunate situations, and find staying enrolled a major, perhaps even impossible, challenge—all through no fault of their own.

Why did you direct your gift to scholarship support?

To provide such scholarship help is something that Sue and I believe in as a very productive use of our money. We are simply grateful that we are able to provide this kind of assistance to students at Wheaton, recognizing not only the importance of Wheaton in Sue’s life, but also the powerful role that President and Mrs. Crutcher have played in the development of Wheaton as a leading liberal arts college.

What do you value most about Wheaton?

We are firm believers in the power of a liberal arts education to transform and enrich lives. We look forward to sharing the blessings that we have received through our liberal arts educations with others. Hopefully, the scholarship recipients, through their liberal arts experience, will have a deeper and more meaningful life. Allowing men and women to complete their Wheaton dream is the completion of a dream for us.

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2014/05/07/transforming-lives/feed/0Wheaton College Homecoming 10/18/2008John Wieland (left), Susan Walden Wieland ’60 (center) and family during Homecoming Weekend in 2008, when the Alumnae/i Association presented Susan with an Alumnae/i Achievement Award in honor of her service in promoting education and the artsHonoring the Crutchershttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2014/05/07/honoring-crutchers/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2014/05/07/honoring-crutchers/#respondThu, 08 May 2014 03:07:25 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=9515The Thomas Anthony Pappas Charitable Foundation recently joined other friends of the college in supporting student scholarships to honor President Ronald A. Crutcher and his wife, Betty Neal Crutcher.

The foundation’s $25,000 grant not only pays tribute to the Crutchers but also augments its existing endowed scholarship fund, the Thomas Anthony Pappas Endowed Scholarship in the Liberal Arts.

Wheaton alumnae/i, parents and friends are choosing to support scholarships as a way of paying tribute to the Crutchers’ personal commitment to helping students. Each year, they greet first-year families when they arrive for orientation, helping to unload minivans, answer myriad questions and share a warm welcome. They stay connected with these students, personally mentoring dozens of young women and men.

In addition, the Crutchers’ philanthropy has been directed to scholarship aid to help ensure that students will not face excessive student loan debt after they graduate.

The Ronald and Betty Neal Crutcher Wheaton Fund Scholarship will confer annual scholarships for the 2014–2015 academic year to deserving students on the basis of academic merit, extracurricular achievements, and/or community service.

The effort will result in both an endowed scholarship fund and a Wheaton Fund scholarship that will be awarded immediately.

President-elect Dennis Hanno met with members of the Wheaton Student Government Association in March.

The Wheaton Board of Trustees voted unanimously on Saturday, February 22, to appoint Dennis Hanno as the college’s new president.

Hanno, currently provost and senior vice president at Babson College, will be the eighth president in Wheaton’s 180-year history. He will take office on July 15, replacing Ronald A. Crutcher, who is stepping down at the end of this academic year after a decade of service.

“There were many impressive and qualified candidates to lead Wheaton College. During our selection process, we listened carefully to the greater Wheaton community and concluded that without a doubt Dennis has what it takes to move this school forward,” said Thomas Hollister, chair of the Wheaton Board of Trustees. “Wheaton has historic commitments to gender equality and diversity, as well as to the power of a rigorous liberal arts education. Dennis is not only equipped to ensure a successful future for Wheaton, he embodies the values on which this school was built.”

Hanno has held several senior leadership positions at Babson College since 2006. Among his many accomplishments at Babson, he is responsible for increasing the emphasis on liberal arts throughout the school’s curriculum. He also led the effort to integrate entrepreneurial thought and principles of socially responsible management throughout the curriculum. Beyond the classroom, Hanno has championed initiatives to enrich students’ residential and co-curricular experiences, focusing on the campus as a seven-day-a-week, 24-hour-a-day living and learning laboratory.

“Throughout my career, I have focused on the importance of diversity, a student-centered approach, and broadening the scope of what students study—from the arts and humanities to the social sciences and the sciences,” said Hanno, 58. “Wheaton College is grounded in values that have inspired my life’s work, and I see tremendous possibilities ahead for this vibrant seat of higher learning. I am extremely honored to have the opportunity to build on Wheaton’s past, and to contribute to its future.”

In addition to his campus-based work, Hanno has founded and led a number of programs dedicated to education and development in Africa during the past decade, working in Uganda, Rwanda, Ghana and Tanzania. He is the founder of the Babson-Rwanda Entrepreneurship Center located in Kigali, Rwanda, which is dedicated to economic and entrepreneurial development within the country. He also created and directed the Babson Entrepreneurial Leadership Academy, which operates in multiple African countries.

Hanno has a deep commitment and belief in the power and value of diversity, and it is one of the many reasons he said he feels akin to Wheaton.

“For well over a century Wheaton focused on creating opportunity for young women, even when those opportunities were rare,” said Hanno. “These roots are clearly evident in its focus today on creating a diverse community that provides opportunity for all.”

Leonard Schlesinger, former president of Babson College, enthusiastically endorses his former colleague, saying: “I have had the benefit and privilege of working with Dennis throughout my tenure as president of Babson College. He is simply one of the most genuinely engaged academic leaders I have ever known. He knows everybody around the college and everything that is going on and is equally comfortable at a faculty curriculum meeting, a student athletic or social event, a budgeting session or with community leaders on one of his regular Africa trips with students, staff and alumni. The Wheaton College community has made an inspired choice…. Working along with Dennis, the college will reach heights and aspirations it has yet to imagine.”

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2014/05/07/wheaton-selects-dennis-hanno-eighth-president/feed/0Wheaton President-Elect Dennis HannoPresident-elect Dennis Hanno met with members of the Wheaton Student Government Association in March.Kathryn Wasserman Davishttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/04/28/katherine-wasserman-davis/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/04/28/katherine-wasserman-davis/#respondSun, 28 Apr 2013 17:51:53 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=7970Kathryn Wasserman Davis, an internationally known philanthropist and scholar who founded a program that supports student peace projects and an endowed faculty chair in Russian Studies at Wheaton, died on April 23, at the age of 106. She was the mother of Wheaton College Trustee Emerita Diana Davis Spencer '60.

"Mrs. Davis was an exceptional advocate for international peace and understanding throughout her life," said President Ronald Crutcher. "Her extraordinary generosity has helped people around the world through the arts, education, environmental conservation and global peace initiatives. Wheaton students are among the many thousands of people whose lives have been enriched by her commitment to building a better world."

A resident of Hobe Sound, Fla., Tarrytown, N.Y., and Northeast Harbor, Maine, she skied into her eighties, played tennis into her nineties and kayaked, swam, painted, traveled and played croquet until this year. An inspiration to those around her, recently she was asked by one of her great-grandchildren to name her favorite day, she instantly replied, "tomorrow."

She received a bachelor’s degree from Wellesley College, a master’s degree in international relations from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. from the University of Geneva in Switzerland. She also held honorary doctorates from Columbia University, Middlebury College and Wheaton.

In 1934, her doctoral dissertation, The Soviets in Geneva, was published and became a best seller in Europe when her controversial prediction that the Soviet Union would join the League of Nations proved both timely and correct. She went on to author numerous articles on foreign affairs in many publications. She also was a frequent lecturer to educational and civic groups in the U.S., India, Russia, China and Switzerland.

Russia and the Soviet Union were her lifelong passion. In 1996, this passion was memorialized when Harvard's Russian Research Center was renamed in honor of her and her late husband, the legendary investor, diplomat and philanthropist Shelby Cullom Davis, former U.S. ambassador to Switzerland.

Kathryn first visited Russia in 1929, traveling through the Caucasus Mountains on horseback. During her lifetime she returned to Russia more than 30 times, developing friendships that included former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, who was her dinner partner at her 95th birthday party.

She dedicated herself to philanthropy. In particular, she was devoted to her alma mater, Wellesley College, where she served as a trustee for 18 years and created the Davis Museum and Cultural Center. At Wheaton, she supported scholarships for the United World College and other international students; operating costs for the Center for Global Education; the Davis Fellows endowment for student projects abroad, and the Shelby Cullom Davis Endowed Professorship in Russian Studies. She also contributed to the effort to build the new Mars Center for Science and Technology, which includes the Diana Davis Spencer '60 Cafe, named for her daughter.

Following the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, Kathryn, at age 94, turned her philanthropic mission to a vision for world peace. For her efforts, she was presented with the Woodrow Wilson Award for Public Service and the EastWest Institute's Peace and Conflict Prevention Award.

For her 100th birthday in 2007, she created the Davis Projects for Peace, which funds 100 student summer projects each year aimed at increasing global understanding. Twelve Wheaton students have won the grant award over the years.

Accepting her honorary degree at Wheaton in 2008, Davis offered some memorable words of wisdom: “My many years have taught me there will always be conflicts. It’s part of human nature. But I will remind you that love, kindness and support are also part of human nature.”

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/04/28/katherine-wasserman-davis/feed/0Education appreciationhttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/03/26/education-appreciation/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/03/26/education-appreciation/#respondWed, 27 Mar 2013 03:12:11 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=7406When Adrienne Wheeler Rudge ’63 arrived at Wheaton, she knew that she had landed in the right place.

“I liked the small classes. I liked the relationships you could have with your teachers, most of whom I thought were top-notch,” said Rudge, an English major. “It was the only time I had gone to a single-sex school during my student career, and there was a nice comfort level there in speaking out in class.”

The value of the education proved itself after she graduated. “I felt very well prepared when I left college, and I enrolled in a master’s program at NYU.” In fact, she recalls reading articles in graduate school classes that were written by the late Professor of English Curtis Dahl.

Rudge remembers friends and fellow students receiving scholarships to attend Wheaton, but her appreciation for such support grew during the years that she taught high school English.

“I had one very talented student heading off to Smith and she needed a scholarship to go,” Rudge said. “Thankfully, she got it, and she’s gone on to be a very resourceful teacher.”

Those experiences are what inspired Rudge to support scholarships at Wheaton in anticipation of her class’s 50th Reunion. “I did it to honor my Wheaton friends and students who have benefited from scholarships.”

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/03/26/education-appreciation/feed/0570_rudge3Go Beyond, Campaign for WheatonWorking capitalhttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/03/26/working-capital/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/03/26/working-capital/#respondWed, 27 Mar 2013 03:10:36 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=7399When she was a junior at Wheaton, Virginia Weil ’65, P’98 discovered the path that led to her career in international business and diplomacy.

She spent the summer working in the office of Alabama Congressman Armistead Selden Jr., a member of her home state’s congressional delegation.

The work itself was typical intern fare—answering constituent mail and a variety of other administrative duties. But Selden also allowed the Wheaton government major to perform research for the House Subcommittee on Latin American Affairs, which he chaired, and a group involved in an area of the world in which Weil was particularly interested.

“I came back to Wheaton in the fall and said, ‘I learned more this summer than in any one course I took,’” Weil said. “Whatever I had been exposed to while doing work as a 20-year-old intern, it opened my eyes to politics, business and government.”

The experience sparked her desire to live and work where the nation’s policy was formed, and it inspired her to provide the means for future students to start their own journey of discovery.

She moved to Washington after graduation, starting her career in the division of foreign affairs of the Congressional Research Office, a service of the Library of Congress.

Today, Weil, who earned an M.B.A. at Georgetown University, is the managing director for the Business Council for International Understanding, an organization that connects senior business executives with heads of state, cabinet ministers and senior government officials. The council also briefs senior officials in the State Department on issues of importance to American businesses working overseas, including issues involving intellectual property protections, price controls and state-sanctioned corruption.

“My summer internship was a stepping stone,” said Weil. “For me, it was a turning point.”

“Wheaton transformed me,” she said. “It wasn’t just the internship. Wheaton certainly gave me an education and the kind of classroom challenge that you don’t get in a large university.”

Her reflections on her college experience, including that internship, led the former Wheaton trustee to establish an endowed fund to support internship stipends for the college’s current and future students.

“I think it’s so important for people to explore their career possibilities,” she said. “Internships expose students to the real world in a way that even good colleges can’t.”

The Virginia A. Weil ’65 Endowed Internship Fund will provide stipends for students interested in careers in international business and diplomacy with emphasis on practical, employment-oriented pursuits.

Weil noted that her family was able to support her during the summer she spent in Washington, D.C. “Not every student can afford to take an unpaid internship and live away from home,” she said. “I hope the students who receive stipends from the fund will have experiences that mean as much to them as mine did to me.”

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/03/26/working-capital/feed/0Virginia Weil ’65Go Beyond, Campaign for WheatonPaying it forwardhttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/03/26/paying-2/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2013/03/26/paying-2/#respondWed, 27 Mar 2013 03:08:47 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=7402Niki Riedell D’Esopo ’93 knew how lucky she was as a student and that inspires her to give back today.

“When I was a freshman entering Wheaton in 1989, it was only the second year of coeducation. I had the best of both worlds—the junior and senior classes were still all women, while the freshman and sophomore classes were coed,” said D’Esopo, who majored in sociology and family studies. “I was able to see the history and traditions of the school as an all women’s college and how they changed as the school became fully coed.”

She also says that her education had immediate practical benefits. “My junior- and senior-year internships were critical in helping me to translate what I learned in school to a career after college,” D’Esopo said.

She interned at senior citizen centers and produced a senior thesis on adult day care. Those experiences led to a position as an outreach coordinator for Andover’s Council on Aging and then to a position managing data for a company providing software services to eldercare organizations.

“The college prepared me with not only academic knowledge, but also the importance of practical work experience,” she said.

However, Wheaton would have been out of reach for D’Esopo had she not received student financial aid. “Everyone knows that college is expensive,” she said. “In my case, making the finances work was complex, but Wheaton worked with my family through a combination of financial aid, summer earnings, part-time work during school, and a named scholarship.”

That experience is what drives D’Esopo and her husband to serve on the college’s President’s Commission and to support a Wheaton Fund Scholarship for current students. “I benefited from another alum’s generosity, and I know that my annual gift makes a difference in helping another student.

“Not only does the student benefit, but it’s my way of showing the college how much I appreciate my education.”

“A scholarship means an opportunity to get an education. It means an opportunity to get an internship. This summer I was able to work at a publication, helping out with their PR and press and writing articles for them.

Without the scholarship, it would not have been possible. I know I wouldn’t be able to be here without it. I wouldn’t be able to participate in extracurriculars without it, and I certainly wouldn’t have had access to the internship I had this summer without it.

Wheaton is a dream. This place is unlike any I’ve ever been. I’ve never been a part of such a welcoming, patient, supportive community—the professors, the students. Thank you, it’s really been perfect.”

“Scholarships have a ripple effect. I’m at Wheaton because I was supported by scholarships and I’m very grateful. My goal has always been to go back to disadvantaged communities like the one I grew up in and help the people there.

I was gone for four months to study in Muscat, Oman. I learned Arabic; I learned to read it, write it and speak it. Now, I’m trilingual. What led me to choose Oman is that it was completely different: a different environment, different religion, different culture. The experience made me a more conscious individual and a more informed individual, and that is very important.”

“I worked with Professor Jani Benoit on a summer research project. We had a lot of one-on-one time, a lot of lab time to learn research skills. I loved it. At a bigger university, if an undergrad is doing research, he is probably making photocopies and handing them to a graduate student. Here, you really are involved. You’re right in the thick of the material. It’s really an experience like no other.

I definitely needed a lot of financial help to get to college. When Wheaton was able to provide it for me, it was a gift. Without it, I don’t know if I would have made it to college.”

The seven-foot metal sculpture, a form composed of graceful looping lines, was donated to the college by Trustee Emeritus Edgar Eisner and his wife, Lucky Dallo Eisner ’53, to ensure that the artwork continues to be an object of admiration and a source of inspiration.

“Lucky and I are delighted that ‘Key Angel’ has found a new home at Wheaton,” Eisner said. “We thought of giving it to the college so that students can enjoy it, and we decided to do that rather than sell it at auction. It’s a more meaninful place for the sculpture to be.”

The Eisners have long been supporters of Wheaton, both in service to the college and as philanthropists and contributors to the Permanent Collection. In the past decade, the Eisners contributed 17 stained-glass panels, the most recent of which arrived late in 2011. They also funded the construction of long-term cases in the lobby of Watson Fine Arts to allow regular display of the works of art, many of which are late medieval and early modern Swiss panels.

“Key Angel” holds the distinction of being the first “long-term” sculpture installed on the Wheaton campus in 45 years, according to Leah Niederstadt, an art history professor and curator of the college’s Permanent Collection. The new sculptural work is particularly welcome given the collection’s use as a teaching tool for classes in the arts, particularly in three-dimensional design, as well as in other disciplines.

“I’ve already used ‘Key Angel’ in one of my classes, ‘Exhibiting Africa: Past and Present,’” said Niederstadt, relating an episode that took place within a week of the sculpture’s arrival. “We were talking about displaying artwork and the process of installing a piece. As part of that discussion, we walked out to the site and talked about the piece and its installation.”

The sculpture also enriches the college’s collection by including another major artist among its holdings. Dill’s work can be found in numerous public and private collections and in leading museums, including the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Museum of Modern Art, both in New York City, and the National Museum of American Art, in Washington, D.C.

Now, the 2011 Wheaton graduate has won a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship that will allow her to follow her dreams of improving health care for women and children, particularly in the developing world.

Mehlhorn, who graduated summa cum laude with a major in biology, will be enrolled next fall at the University of London’s School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, working toward a master’s degree in reproductive and sexual health research. She was sponsored by the Rotary Club of Camden, Maine.

“Due to gender discrimination, women and girls are generally the most marginalized members of any society and therefore are often the poorest both in terms of economics and health,” Mehlhorn says, explaining her interest in the field of study.

“I am interested in understanding the global health issues facing women today, the policies that have been developed to address these problems, and the implementation success of such programs aimed at improving women’s health.”

The Nobleboro, Maine, native says she arrived on the Wheaton campus aspiring toward a career in medicine, but not convinced that it was within her reach.

“It wasn’t until Wheaton and my experiences during college that I realized it was something I was truly passionate about and something I could realistically achieve,” says Mehlhorn, who is currently working as a research assistant in a neurology lab at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston.

Mehlhorn developed as a scholar through deep immersion in her subject. She served as a research assistant to Professor Shawn McCafferty; conducted genetics research as an intern at the Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor, Maine; and completed an honors thesis involving genetic analysis of grey harbor seals. She also held positions at Wheaton as a teaching assistant and a tutor in biology.

The Wheaton Trustee Scholar says that her experiences while studying abroad in South Africa helped to crystalize her growing fascination with public health issues for women and children.

“Through the program I performed a study project that allowed me to work in the maternity ward of a rural hospital and get a glimpse of maternal health in this still racially divided country,” she says. “This glimpse contrasted drastically with the view of health I had when interning at a local women’s clinic in my hometown during the previous summer.”

Study at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine will fit her interests particularly well, says Mehlhorn. “This program focuses study on the developing world and it is a great introduction to policy-relevant research.”

The purpose of the ambassadorial scholarship program is to further international understanding and friendly relations among people of different countries. While abroad, scholars serve as ambassadors of goodwill to the people of the host country and give presentations about their homelands to Rotary clubs and other groups.

Photo by Nicki Pardo

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/05/17/advocating-global-health/feed/0570_Mehlhorn 5L3X5088Success for studentshttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/success-students/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/success-students/#respondSat, 24 Mar 2012 03:06:53 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=5052That’s the goal of Go Beyond: Campaign for Wheaton. The generosity of alumnae/i, parents and friends is making a difference for students by expanding scholarship resources, creating funds for student-faculty research and improving campus facilities. The campaign now stands at $105 million, on its way toward the goal of $120 million by June 30, 2014.

Progress in numbers

Science center:

$35,011,279 committed to expanding and enhancing science facilities through the Mars Center for Science and Technology.

Goal: $35 million

Student scholarships:

$33,511,858 committed to increasing scholarship support for Wheaton students and their families.

Goal: $50.6 million

Annual support:

$24,902,729 contributed to the Wheaton Fund since July 1, 2005. Alumnae/i, parents and friends have committed $2,826,988 since July 1, 2011.

Goal: $4.3 million for fiscal year 2012 (ending on June 30, 2012); $34.4 million by June 30, 2014.

Student-faculty research:

$400,000 committed to support student-faculty research collaborations through the establishment of endowed funds for that purpose.

Artificial turf field:

Construction by fall 2013 of an artificial turf field and lighting to expand opportunities for intercollegiate, club and intramural sports.

More online

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/success-students/feed/0Go Beyond, Campaign for WheatonA conversation with… Margaret Dunn Smith ’73https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/conversation-withmargaret-dunn-smith-73/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/conversation-withmargaret-dunn-smith-73/#respondSat, 24 Mar 2012 03:06:22 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=5050The Quarterly recently caught up with Trustee Margaret ”Maggie” Dunn Smith ’73, the busy owner and operator of the Warren (Vt.) Store and two luxury inns, Winvian in Litchfield Hills, Conn., and the Pitcher Inn in Warren, Vt. A member of the Campaign Steering Committee, Smith shared her feelings about Wheaton, the campaign and the spirit of giving.

What message do you take from the campaign’s success so far?

In spite of these challenging economic times, philanthropy at Wheaton has never been stronger. Donors clearly understand that a Wheaton education is a transformative experience. Our alumnae/i, parents and friends recognize the importance of donating generously to honor Wheaton’s past and to preserve its legacy for future generations.

Of the remaining priorities for the campaign (student scholarships, student-faculty research funds or the Wheaton Fund), which one means the most to you and why?

All three are of critical importance to the successful completion of this campaign. Personally, I contribute annually to support my endowed scholarship and the Wheaton Fund. Student scholarships are vital to the Wheaton community because they enable qualified candidates to enroll regardless of their ability to pay. My four siblings and I were fortunate to attend liberal arts institutions thanks to the hard work of our parents, who impressed upon us the lifelong value of learning in a rigorous environment. I share my parents’ dedication to the education process and will continue to help qualified students gain access to the same benefits I was privileged to enjoy.

What is the most important message about the campaign that you would want others to know?

Every gift makes a difference and is tremendously appreciated! Our gifts make it possible for Wheaton to hire outstanding faculty, improve campus facilities, build and renovate student housing, and enhance science, technology, the arts and athletics. All of these are necessary to attract a highly qualified and diverse student body. The recent completion of the spectacular Mars Center for Science and Technology is a wonderful example of what can be accomplished when individuals work together toward a common goal.

You recently said that your community’s response to a disaster at your inn in Vermont reminded you of Wheaton. How so?

Last fall, a stream rose 15 feet to become a raging river that ran through Warren, leaving silt, mud and devastation behind. I was completely blown away by the outpouring of the Pitcher Inn and Warren Store staff, friends, acquaintances and strangers who rallied to help. With strong backs, willing hands and loving hearts, they removed six truckloads of dirt and debris — all by hand in a bucket-brigade formation. It was a most amazing display of support. I feel that this same kind of love and attention comes to institutions like Wheaton because of shared bonds and experiences. The right cause bubbles up to the top, and supporters appear. Everyone shares the rewards because they all share a stake in the greater community.

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/conversation-withmargaret-dunn-smith-73/feed/0570_Maggie Dunn SmithLifelong connectionhttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/lifelong-connection/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/lifelong-connection/#respondSat, 24 Mar 2012 03:05:42 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=5048Wheaton students will benefit for years to come from a scholarship fund established through a generous gift from the estate of Helen Dixon Kunzelmann P’65.

Mrs. Kunzelmann, a graduate of the Dana Hall School and Vassar College, was the mother of Susan Kunzelmann ’65, who passed away in 1994, and the mother-in-law of Joan Margaret Atwood Kunzelmann ’65.

The establishment of the scholarship reflects the Kunzelmann family’s connection to Wheaton and the strong bonds of friendship that Susan forged at the college, says her sister-in-law Joan Kunzelmann ’65. “She was larger than life.”

One of her classmates, Jean Jones Beard ’65, also remembers Susan as a vibrant person with a strong personality. “Somewhere I have a photo of her. It was taken at school. She’s holding a book, the title of which read Dynamite. That summed up Susan,” Beard said. “She was a feisty, independent, involved, creative student who always kept us on our toes. She went on to become a very interesting woman.”

Alexandra Marshall ’65 described her classmate and friend as an adventurer and an explorer in every way, a French major and a one-time ski instructor who became interested in spirituality and studied theology as an adult.

“Her papers would always be late because she would write a 75-page paper for a five-page assignment,” Marshall said. “I don’t know what her teachers thought of it. But I remember that some idea would catch her interest and she would just pursue it.”

The bonds formed at Wheaton inspired a continuing connection to the family after Susan’s death, said Joan Kunzelmann, and that was important to her mother. “A number of Susan’s friends remained in contact with Helen for the remainder of her life, and she enjoyed their friendship.”

Beyond the connection to the college, the scholarship fund also expresses Helen’s personal commitment to the importance of learning. “Mrs. Kunzelmann felt very strongly about the value of education and she made gifts to a number of educational institutions that were important in her own life and in the life of her children,” her daughter-in-law explained.

Like her daughter Susan, Helen took great pleasure in life, which was evident in her hearty laugh, Marshall said. “She was just very faithful and incredibly energetic. She threw herself into various activities around Bennington, Vt., particularly gardening. Gardening was a big interest of hers.”

While available to all students from New Jersey and Vermont, the scholarship places a special emphasis on assisting students from Boonton, N.J., where Mrs. Kunzelmann grew up, and Bennington, Vt., where she spent most of her adult life.

Her friends and family say those priorities reflect her love for the communities in which she lived. A dedicated gardener throughout her life, Kunzelmann was active in the Bennington Garden Club and the Garden Club of America. She also was a member of the National Society of the Colonial Dames of America and a former Regent of Gunston Hall in Virginia.

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/lifelong-connection/feed/0570_susan_kunzelmann_3Women in mathhttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/women-math/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/women-math/#respondSat, 24 Mar 2012 03:05:22 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=5044A program to promote women pursuing careers in the male-dominated field of mathematics that was founded by Assistant Professor of Mathematics Rachelle DeCoste has won a grant from the National Security Agency (NSA).

The $12,000 award from the NSA will help fund the Career Mentoring Workshop, which is scheduled to take place at the end of June. The three-day gathering prepares women who are Ph.D. candidates in math for their job search and creates a network of mentors and peers.

“I am excited that we are able to continue the mentoring after taking last summer off due to lack of funding,” Professor DeCoste said. “I’m also particularly excited to host the workshop in our new spaces in the Mars Center for Science and Technology!”

DeCoste, who joined the Wheaton faculty in 2008 after teaching at the United States Military Academy at West Point, was inspired to create the workshop because of her own experiences. She conducted the first mentoring workshop at West Point last August.

“After I finished my Ph.D.,” she said, “I would run into women I knew from graduate school or other math programs I had been affiliated with as they were finishing their Ph.D.s, and they were on the job market. They would have the usual stress that goes with finding a job and felt like they had no one they could talk to. So I would share my experience honestly, and that included discussing all the doubts I had. A couple of them told me afterward that these honest, open discussions really helped them.”

Twelve to 15 participants are invited to each summer’s workshop. Five junior faculty members from various academic institutions will mentor participants throughout the workshop. The mentors are women who have recently finished their own Ph.D.s and who now work in academia. These women will share their experiences of finishing their degrees and navigating the job search. Additional senior mathematicians will be invited to work with the participants as well.

Throughout the years, the program’s funding has been provided by the MAA/Tensor Foundation Program, Wheaton College, the United States Military Academy, the EDGE Program, and the Summer Math Program at Carleton College.

This current Keefe gift signals immediate financial relief for a Wheaton student and continues the foundation’s long history of giving to Wheaton, which includes the creation of the Keefe Boston Latin Scholarship Endowed Fund in 1997 and the Keefe Family Foundation Work and Learning Fellows Endowment, a critical resource for self-designed student internships. The award also augments the Keefe Project Scholarship, a five-year grant that facilitated larger financial aid packages for increased numbers of students and a Keefe-created endowment established for repair and upkeep of Keefe Field.

Keefe Family Foundation contributions to Wheaton over recent years total more than $300,000, impacting all areas of the campus and curriculum.

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/23/championing-wheaton/feed/0Rosalie Brown Ciummeihttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/15/5156/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/15/5156/#respondThu, 15 Mar 2012 12:32:45 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=5156Rosalie (Brown) Ciummei, professor emerita of physical education, passed away unexpectedly on Tuesday, March 13th after a brief and courageous battle with cancer. Professor Ciummei had been a member of the Wheaton faculty and chair of the Physical Education Department.She joined the Wheaton faculty in 1962, retiring in 1996.

Visiting hours will be held on Saturday, March 17th from 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm at the Norton Memorial Funeral Home, 19 Clapp Street, Norton, MA. In lieu of flowers, donations in her memory may be made to the Scleroderma Federation/N.E. Chapter, 462 Boston Avenue, Suite 1-1, Topsfield, MA 01983-1239. www.scleroderma.org.

]]>https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2012/03/15/5156/feed/0Never this much light in New York Cityhttps://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2011/08/30/light-york-city/
https://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/2011/08/30/light-york-city/#respondTue, 30 Aug 2011 11:50:20 +0000http://wheatoncollege.edu/quarterly/?p=4240

I talked to my friend on Monday, the day Wall Street resumed business after the attack on the Twin Towers. He's a banker, and, perhaps out of obligation to his profession, he is not one who easily shows his emotions. He is not easily rattled. He's usually the first with a slightly off-color joke or a flippant comment aimed at taking the edge off a situation. But on Monday, the tone in his voice was unmistakable. There was no joke, no dismissive intonation.

You see, we both knew there was no way to take the edge off of this situation. We'd both been there--Alex at 8:47 a.m. when the first airliner struck the World Trade Center, and me 36 hours later as the corpse of a New York City firefighter was pulled from the rubble. We'd both witnessed things that we knew would change us forever. We knew everything would be different now--not necessarily in any grand, sweeping way, but in a way that rose within us to somewhere just beneath the point of comprehension. It was something--wass something--that neither of us can wrap our minds around, neither of us can explain, neither of us can process. And so on Monday, on the telephone, we shared silence.

And then, finally--his voiced cracking--Alex said, "You know, there was never this much light on Wall Street before."

"Never this much light on Wall Street before." At first I didn't understand what he meant, but then it hit me. Those two towers rearing up into the screaming blue had turned lower Manhattan's canyons into even deeper and darker recesses. Now, with the towers gone, light spilled freely into the city streets like the rush of floodwater down a brittle, dry arroyo. As an English teacher and one who is prone to reading too much into everything, my metaphor meter went into overdrive. "Never this much light on Wall Street," I repeated to myself. And the paradox was clear: Somehow amidst this incomprehensible tragedy, there was immeasurable brilliance, there was light.

And I thought back to how it was for me, stepping off a bus at Ground Zero. Ten o'clock at night. The devastation exposed in the clinical glare white of utility lights powered by the whir and chug of generators pulsing into the night air. It was a light that blinded, yet hid nothing. I thought back to that first ambulance ride I'd ever taken. The stitches were barely pulled snug on the EMT patch I wore on my sleeve. I remembered the advice my partner, a veteran paramedic, gave me, "Just make sure you focus; otherwise the scene will overwhelm you. Find something to do, focus on a task, don't let the scene get into your head."

Yet on Wednesday night at Ground Zero I stood there, completely overwhelmed, completely unfocused. The lights seemed to burn brighter, etching the horror deeper and deeper into my brain. My stomach hurt like I'd been kicked[~]a gut-clenching pain. And it wasn't only the visuals, the things I saw. It was the smells and the sounds. The acrid air. The glass beneath my feet. Someone was talking. We were moving toward a makeshift field hospital. "No, there have been no survivors yet tonight," somebody said. And then a passing firefighter grabbed my arm. "Hey, Doc," he said. "Put that respirator on, will ya?"

I looked into his face, blackened and drained of life. I looked at his immense hand on my shoulder. The width of his shoulders was that of two men. "Thanks," I said, pulling the mask in place. But he was already gone, and once again the scene crowded in on my senses. Off to my left a bucket brigade of volunteers was blazing a path through the immense pile of twisted debris, one brick at a time. To my right, a crane was working, carefully lifting a large piece of concrete into the back of a waiting truck. There were National Guardsmen in fatigues, somebody handing out bottled water.

While I was still taking it all in, a man in a white shirt and a red helmet collapsed to the ground near me. His friend knelt anxiously by his side. Suddenly the stethoscope around my neck reminded me of my purpose. It gave meaning to my being there. I'd come to help, and all at once there was something for me to do, somebody I could help, some way that I could make a difference. I fell into the routine of vitals and patient history, assessment and treatment. Mike had been working for 30 hours without sleep, his friend told me. He was dehydrated, exhausted and bleeding from a nasty cut on his leg. "Rebar," his buddy explained. "It happened yesterday." Mike's heart was racing; his respirations came fast. His eyes were red and tearing. A deep cough echoed from his chest. He told me he'd lost his brother. I flagged down an ambulance for him, and he disappeared like a ghost into the night.

I walked around in a daze for a time after my interaction with Mike. I saw a firefighter in an orange body bag come from the wreckage. I saw an ambulance in the distance, its lights slashing into the night, and I walked toward it instinctually. It wasn't until I was close enough to touch it that I realized it was covered in ash, all its windows blown out, surreally agape. I reached in and turned off the lights.

I made my way to the field hospital where a volunteer was having his eyes flushed, another man was connected to an IV, a search-and-rescue dog whimpered, his eyes burning from the gases, his nose choked with dust. An EMT bandaged a bleeding paw. I stood there for a time with the other EMS volunteers, arms folded, looking on, waiting for the victims of this tragedy to be found. Waiting for something to do. And finally I couldn't take it anymore. The disorganization was immense, and no one noticed as I pushed my stethoscope into my pocket, exchanged my surgical gloves for work gloves, and joined the line of men on the bucket brigade stringing into the smoldering heap like an impossibly large worm snaking into the heart of a very great darkness.

The world closed in on the man in front of me and the man behind me. On the white plastic bucket coming down the line. On those things in my own field of vision. On those things I found. The heavier the buckets the better, I thought--less opportunity to think about anything besides the burn in your muscles and the pumping of your own heart. The first human remains I saw were nothing like a human at all. Perhaps a shattered piece of concrete or maybe a piece of ductwork or somebody's handbag, but not a person. And then there were other pieces and we picked them up, each, one at a time, like we were cleaning up our room or tidying up the yard. Body parts went into green bags, full corpses into orange. There was a system, it was a job, and each of us did it as best we were able.

We kept our sights on that person we would rescue, the living human we would pull from the wreckage. But that never happened. There were no dramatic rescues. No spirits raised, no celebration of the resilience of life in the face of adversity. This was the worst of humanity, and as I rode out of that war zone on top of a fire engine at sunrise, I was disheartened, and I wondered why I had come at all.

But then at the Fourteenth street NYPD roadblock everything changed. The sun was up now, brilliant light spilling across the Hudson River. And there, at 7 a.m., were New Yorkers[~]everyday people, waving flags and cheering at every emergency vehicle that went by. A firefighter who sat beside me started to cry. And it was then that I realized that these times[~]these apparently catastrophic events, these tragedies[~]reveal not only the worst of humanity, but also its best. Those people on the streets of New York were as much the heroes as the emergency workers at Ground Zero. And, in a rush of emotion, I suddenly understood what Walt Whitman meant when he wrote, "I understand the large hearts of heroes."

It was like Alex had said on the phone, except it occurred to me that it wasn't just Wall Street. It occurred to me that there has never been this much light in New York City.

Ret Talbot is an emergency medical technician and the director of public relations at Oldfields School in Glencoe, Md.